We hear a lot about the Constitution these days. Lawmakers across the political spectrum wield the document like a club to bludgeon opponents.

"It's an amazing document, pervading every aspect of our lives, but most people haven't actually read it," said Christopher Phillips, a senior fellow in the critical writing department at the University of Pennsylvania. "They rail about it, but if you ask them if they've read it, they say, 'Uh, no.'

"One thing I really believe is that the authors of the document, from the most radical to the most conservative, would be absolutely stunned - and not a little dismayed - at how little it has changed over more than two centuries."

Phillips will be here this week as part of Gemini Ink's Breakthrough Thinkers series.

A graduate of the College of William and Mary and avid student of the Constitution, Phillips is the author of "Socrates Café" and "Constitution Café: Jefferson's Brew for a True Revolution," books that have grown out of hundreds of dialogues, or "cafés," Phillips has led all over the country since 1996.

He will guide a free dialogue at the University of Texas at San Antonio at 7 p.m. Thursday, following it up with a colloquium and luncheon at 11:30 a.m. Friday at Pearl Stable. Tickets are $50. Call 210-734-9673 for more information.

Contacted by phone in Philadelphia, the 53-year-old Virginia native said he envisions his presentations here as "a Socratic look at the Constitution, a thoughtful inquiry based on the Socratic impulse that should celebrate a difference of opinion."

During his years of, as he puts it, "gallivanting across the fruited plain," Phillips said one of the main themes to emerge is that "Americans across the political spectrum feel left out of the political process. There is a growing desire to participate more directly."

"What unites Americans in every generation is that they agree the government is woefully dysfunctional," he said. "So in the cafés, we look at the existing document and what people would change about the Constitution if they could, how they would unmuddy it."

The U.S. Constitution grew out of dissatisfaction with the original Articles of Confederation, a decentralized form of government for the 13 original states.

"After being shackled by England, they didn't want a strong national government, so under the Articles all the states had to agree before any action was taken, and the states couldn't agree on anything. So it was impossible to get things done," Phillips said.

Delegates gathered in Philadelphia's Independence Hall in 1787 and, under the primary guidance of James Madison, considered "the father of the Constitution," hammered out the document that has been admired and copied around the world.

"Rhode Island didn't even send a delegate, perhaps smelling a rat," Phillips said. "And 16 delegates left during the proceedings, leaving only 39 to sign the document. The meetings were held behind closed doors, and there is no public record of the debates. When Jefferson found this out, he was outraged."

Speaking of Jefferson, he believed that the Constitution "should be revisited every 20 years or so and the process started from scratch," Phillips said.

"He believed every generation should establish its own rights and responsibilities."